Here in Germany, the conservative and (neo)liberal parties privatized quite a few sectors because that would make them more "efficient" and cost the tax payer less. Parts of the retirement pay system was privatized as well and there are even projects for private investors to build streets and other infrastructure projects. In the end, all of these projects became even more costly and inefficient than they would have been if the state had continued to own them. The private part of the retirement pay system has already been exposed as a fraud which favors the investors behind it and takes money away from the depositors. But because the legend of state inefficiency and private institutions efficiency has to be hold up such things are never directly questioned by those parties, something I have seen in many libertarian and conservative parties. Europes banking sector was largely left to its own for decades, with very small state interference.. and the banks began to gamble and invested in risky financial assets which led to the banking crisis of 2008. The EU had to bail them out, costing the tax payers billions. Of course they kept their profits for themselves, heaven forbid anyone saying otherwise.
All libertarians I ever met have the same problem. They are extremely suspicious of the state (not always without reason) but strangely naively trusting in the free market. There is no scientific evidence that the free market automatically leads to profit for everyone and that there is a force at work keeping it stable and orderly (competition for example). This sometimes takes on nearly religious levels. The problem is: there is no such force. Competition in economics and politics doesn't favor the best, it favors the ones who can trick the most people in thinking they are the best and the ones who already start with more than others. People don't make rational decisions all the time, the Homo economicus is nothing but an ideal. Morality also gets the short end as well: Human rights (except for pretty much meaningless "freedom") have no basis in libertarian civilisations and a weak state will never be able to enforce them on ever more powerful corporations. In the end I fear that libertarian countries will always end up with monopolies owning nearly everyone and only acting in their own interest (which as we have seen time and time again in the last few decades doesn't line up with most of the populations or even humanitys own interest). I always favored Germanys social market system as a good (but admittedly not perfect) compromise of socialism and free market capitalism and the constant push for more privatizations here makes me cringe because I don't think it leads to the right direcrtion, especially when private organisations have control over essential things like water. Just my thoughts on the issue.
I am still not convinced by the way that he isn't a deep-cover democrat. I can't tell the difference. It's also interesting how his candidacy challenges the GOP and might change it. Interesting times...
I'm not one much for conspiracy theories, but at this point, I wouldn't be overly shocked if this one was true.
We have two demagogues running for President and both are arguably sociopaths but somehow Gary Johnson is considered "edgy." LOL. Oh no, don't vote for Gary, he might push for marijuana decriminalization and minor tax cuts... how scary! This electorate cracks me up. He's the Bud Light of libertarianism, but he's still got my vote over those two.
Anyway, if it has to be Trump or Hillary then I guess my poison is Trump. Because they're both equally evil to me, so I'm going with spite. I don't take kindly to the way SJWs have tried to hijack this election and threatened (and even enacted) violence upon those who dared defy them. They will no doubt riot and burn our cities when Trump is elected and, as usual, they will blame it on Trump since they are incapable of wrongdoing. But I would compare it to the Garland, Texas case: if someone threatens to kill us for drawing cartoons, I'd rather be with the cartoonists than the killers.
I'm so glad we finally moved on from cussing everyone of being a SJW...
Holy crap I was reading that article and saw North Korea endorsed Trump. How did I miss that one. How can anyone think this is a good candidate for president?
I wish I could say I was shocked, but so much crazy ***** has already gone down this election cycle, the only response I can really give is "Huh." The only thing that could genuinely surprise me at this point is Trump and Putin coming out as a gay couple.
Don't misunderstand me, I don't really believe that theory, but exactly like you I wouldn't be shocked at this point. It also makes the whole ugly mess of an election much more bearable for me... and I'm not even a United States citizen!
Interesting fact: The trend of calling anyone having percieved "PC" views a SJW has made it to europe as well. Here in Germany the term that is being thrown around is "Gutmensch" (german equivalent of "do-gooder") which I find even more inane. Now wanting to do good is bad as well just because it doesn't align to your political views? Give me a break.
Well, he seems to like Putin very much and we all know how much Putin loves taking half-nude pictures... I'm just saying, it's not of the table
We have two demagogues running for President and both are arguably sociopaths but somehow Gary Johnson is considered "edgy." LOL. Oh no, don't vote for Gary, he might push for marijuana decriminalization and minor tax cuts... how scary! This electorate cracks me up. He's the Bud Light of libertarianism, but he's still got my vote over those two.
Anyway, if it has to be Trump or Hillary then I guess my poison is Trump. Because they're both equally evil to me, so I'm going with spite. I don't take kindly to the way SJWs have tried to hijack this election and threatened (and even enacted) violence upon those who dared defy them. They will no doubt riot and burn our cities when Trump is elected and, as usual, they will blame it on Trump since they are incapable of wrongdoing. But I would compare it to the Garland, Texas case: if someone threatens to kill us for drawing cartoons, I'd rather be with the cartoonists than the killers.
Oh man, Trump and Hillary equally evil demagogues? SJWs rioting in the streets? Implying that only Trump is against terrorism or all muslimes are threatening to kill someoe because of drawings? Hyperbole after Hyperbole? Well I assume Trump IS the right choice for you then. Hillary is no angel, but definitely not a sociopath, that's for sure.
No one stops you from voting Johnson, just do it if you want to.
Not all states require the electoral college to vote the way their popular vote went; and so that means you can have "faithless" electoral votes, where the electoral college vote differs from what the popular vote says it should be. So, it's entirely possible that Trump could hemorrhage additional electoral votes if those electors don't see him as fit for office. That means that even solid red states may be some shade of purple, making it even harder for the GOP nominee to win a position in government; which frankly might be a good reason for this system to have even been set up.
Even in the states that do force you to hold to the popular vote there aren't that many that have penalties for not doing so. It seems that a lot of them work on the honour system and trust that the electors will vote according to the instructions they receive from the states.
As a European (to be more exact German) that has always confused me about the electoral system in the US. Here in Germany we have two votes: One party vote and one for our local representative in the Bundestag (our primary legislative power). Both count directly for the results of the vote. Granted, Germany has less than a third of the population of the US, but then again, both are technologically advanced countries, counting votes shouldn't be that hard (I think, of course I know about the Florida debacle in the 2000 election). I mean, theoretically every single voter could vote for Hillary and still get Trump if all electors decide to do "faithless" votes. Doesn't that sound slightly odd to anyone else as well? Just a thought.
On another note, pretty much all european states (except for extreme right-wing parties inside of them) seem to favor Hillary because Trump seems to be viscious, hyperaggressive, doesn't consider facts of any kind (his campaign seems to have embraced the paradigm "Facts don't matter, feelings do!" as far as I can tell from Interviews which is quite worrying) and does nothing to show himself as being reliable or balanced. On the other hand it is also quite clear that Hillary isn't that great a deal either (many over here would have preferred Sanders).
I am still not convinced by the way that he isn't a deep-cover democrat. I can't tell the difference. It's also interesting how his candidacy challenges the GOP and might change it. Interesting times...
EDIT: And if anyone is interested, politifact.com lists how many statements of Hilary and Trump were wrong (or even "pants on fire" wrong). It looks much worse for one of them, I can tell you...
I just realized something. Remember all those inconsistencies? Like, Emrakul apparently not wanting to purge Innistrad but going there regardless and only stopping when directly confronted? And her twisting and contorting life but we never actually see her create something, despite her title as the world-creator? And how she used to devour large chunks of Zendikar?
I know now! Emrakul IS a world devourer. She has never changed. She's the same as Kozilek and Ulamog, only out to consume, without any sort of function. She just wants us to think she has a purpose. She wants us to believe that harming her will have negative conseqeuences in the long run. She wants us to consider her as irreplacable. She is trying to convince us that she is not so bad after all. Emrakul is screwing with our minds. She is so powerful, she is even twisting the perceptions of the reader. The fourth wall is crumbling under her influence.
Nothing is safe! All is doomed! Embrace oblivion!
*sprouts tentacles*
Well, she was lured there and the Emeria projection (which was not Emrakul herself mind you) didn't say anything of her not wanting to purge Innistrad, just that she expected it to somehow be more "appreciative" of her influence. Once she found out it was too late and she had to manipulate the gatewatch to seal herself for as of yet unknown reasons.
Well, she does create mutations and we don't know what her influence would entail on a depleted or lifeless world. We just don't know enough about her true purpose (if there is one) to judge for now. And she probably can still consume mana to replenish herself. She took as much as she needed from Zendikar and then left directly which wouldn't make much sense if she were focussed on consuming as Ulamog for example was. I don't see the inconsistencies you are speaking of is what I'm saying.
Or Emrakul is just using me to disguise the truth. Who knows?
I'm still confused by Arlinn's poofing out of the story. I mean, the last time she was mentioned was when she convinced the humans to have werewolves fight alongside them. And then there were these ambigious two white werewolves in the battle at Thraben. One might have been Arlinn, but the other? Then there was Thalia and her army. They did get into Thraben but were nowhere to be seen when the gatewatch did their thing. Was the army eliminated?
I suppose it's okay to use characters that don't affect the story that much, but at least don't just forget about them midway through after building them up to their supposed story relevant moment.
I was disappointed by that too. I think they all succumbed to Emrakuls madness directly after she began to "blossom" the same way the Gatewatch did. Arlinn will probably get more screen time when she reappears in the future (similar to Tamiyo). I know that this was the last story of EMN, but I hope and believe that there will be a story about the aftermath before we go to Kaladesh. Hopefully we'll see Arlinn, Thalia and Sigarda then.
I'm sure you'll find reason to loathe whatever comes next.
Comments like these is what makes me just not want to post here anymore. Listen man, I'm not a mindless hater. I've explained my points regarding why I think the story is bad, and everyone has their free reign to disagree with me. If you will just make a mockery out of my criticism, I will probably just leave the forum for good. I post here my opinion despite of it being different of everyone else, because I think a forum is more productive when you can dispute your ideas with others instead of just being an echo chamber of itself. If the story is naturally bad, as is the case for a lot of the articles, most people that dislike it will just stop reading it and what is left is just people that appreciate it. If you go to the rumor mill you'll see people shivering to the mention of the Magic Story, and I honestly think it doesn't need to be like that. However, if you want to think everything is fine and make jokes about people who think the story is bad then sooner or later there will be no one left for you to make jokes. People will leave, because it is nor worth it.
And look it up more on the internet. Yes, I can't account for all the stories of cosmic horrors that ever existed. Sometimes people will personify or give intentions to cosmic entities, but the point of their concept is that they don't. The story is not about the entity themselves, that's why they don't need personification. And Cthulhu wasn't "beat by a boat", he was regenerating when there was sismic activity and he was sealed back into R'lyeh. You guys think this story did justice to the cosmic horror trope, I think it failed miserably. There were but shreds of the realization of how insignificant and small the humans were when facing Emrakul. As a matter of fact Liliana was actively convinced that she could beat Emrakul, together with the other members of the gatewatch. Jace's jokes also don't help instigate any fear of hopelesness. It is very artificial, poorly written, badly developed.
I will say again: there was no mystery. Jace went around stumbling into people that told him what was happening. He didn't really put pieces of clues together, and if your argument is 'he went mad', then don't sell it as mystery story.
"He found Tamiyo, he stirred up Liliana, his beginning madness made him vulnerable to Emrakuls influence, he persuaded Tamiyo into helping him... without his investigation, Emrakul wouldn't have had the means to seal herself, perhabs even influencing both him and Tamiyo from the start
This is not an investigation. He could've found these things just by being a character in a world. We didn't see him gathering clues, developing a framework, coming to a conclusion. Basically when the eldrazi hit it had NOTHING to do with Jace's investigation, he didn't find it ahead of time, so there was literally no need to pretend he was looking for something. His ultimate plan was to segregate a part of himself... why that would stop Emrakul from sealing herself? This is just pure speculation. The gatewatch might have gone mad and Emrakul could've controlled them to seal herself anyways, she didn't need them sane to seal her.
The eldrazi as a whole received and actively bad treatment, from start to finish.
The only definition tvtropes provides is that Eldritch Abominations have to break the internal logic of a work to be considered as such. That's definitely true for the Eldrazi (and Emrakul isn't the pages picture for nothing). They are not bound by the five colors, they exist outside the planes and they warp physical and biological laws. Nowhere does it state that they can't have personalities (and I got you three example from Lovecraft alone, nevermind that Cosmic Horror is not bound to Lovecraft alone).
Cthulu was defeated by it, just not permanently (which is possible within Cosmic Horror as I've laid out in my first post). And Liliana was grossly overestimating herself, something totally in character for her. It might even have been her own version of the madness. Remember, she was once kind of an Abomination herself. Oldwalkers certainly fit many of the criteria.
Well, of course they had to keep the whole utter despair more subtle than in Lovecrafts works, it's still a game about battling each other. It would have been a short story if the army amassed by St. Traft and Thalia would succumb to it and joined the madness back in SOI. The point is that Emrakul herself was never even in danger of being defeated. She manipulated everything as she saw it fit the whole time and will probably continue her work in the future.
As for Jaces jokes: Trying to cover fear with humor is a coping mechanism widely used by human beings. The story made it pretty clear that he tried to use it to not fall into total despair (at least that's how I read it). Jace also never investigated who the culprit behind the madness on Innistrad was, he wanted to find Sorin at the start of SOI. I will go so far to say that he wasn't the Investigator of the story, Tamiyo was. She did do all the things you described and figured out that Avacyn was holding back something powerful from Innistrad which at the same time caused her madness. I'll give you that Jaces part of the story was not part of the investigation then directly.
Emeria was an effect on Jaces mind, he didn't create her. She was everything of Emrakuls true personality his mind was able to grasp in any kind of form. But she wasn't Emrakul herself. His seperated self was another thing entirely.
I see where you are coming from but as I said, I can't agree with you. And I for one liked the SOI/EMN part of the story (except for a few aspects) quite a bit and didn't "lower my standards".
So, lots of people replied, I will make a general statement:
I'm not saying magic should or should not do its own thing with cosmic horror, I'm saying they're not being true to the genre by creating personified entities. People may find personified entities like the Endless more interesting, but the point of cosmic horror was never to focus on the entities, but more on the effect that their influence from outter space might have on common people. It is much more about the horror that they evoke once you get in touch with the 'truths' that they revealed than about the entitites themselves. Yes, there were exceptions like Nyarlathotep the Crawling Chaos, but he doesn't invalidate the rule (and it is debatable if he could be put in the same pantheon as the Great Old Ones or if he acted more as an emissary).
To me the focus of using the eldrazi is all wrong. They shouldn't be beatable or defeated. And trust me, there are good stories to tell even knowing that a cosmic entity is in the brink of destroying your plane. I realized that they're not going for the same approach when... well... Ulamog and Kozilek got defeated. Personifying Emrakul is just another step towards ignoring the whole point of that genre, and that's what makes me pissed. I understand the criticism of failing to do justice to oldwalkers as well, but I can't relate to that because I never really read old lore. To me the conflict Nahiri/Sorin was more interesting, spawned more debate and was more relatable to the community as a whole. To people that found it boring, I ask: was this rushed over the top conclusion of the eldrazi arc better? I will give to them that the initial mistery of not knowing what was happening with Avacyn and the angels was curious, but I'd say that once we reached half of SOI it was clear that they wouldn't progress with the mystery, just keep saying that it was a 'mystery'. Not only that, but once we reached the next set, the mystery is completely thrown out of the window and it becomes crystal clear that everything was eldrazi. This "mystery" story is an offense to everything with its name, because there was no story at all. There were some hints in the cards, but Jace's 'investigation' didn't matter at any point whatsoever.
So yeah, between a terrible mystery story, a rushed presentation and sealing of Emrakul (with a bonus unnecessary personification) I was much more intrigued by the background story of Sorin and Nahiri going at each other.
Ok, I couldn't disagree more with you. As someone else said, in the original genre, you COULD talk to eldritch abominations (at least certain ones like Nyarlhotep (he was not "just an exception" by the way, I remember other outer gods like Yog-Sototh interacting with humans too, it even had a son with one)) and you could even sometimes grasp some of their agencies (both of which was not good for your mental and physical health though). In "The Dunwich Horror" one such abomination was clearly destroyed before it could destroy the whole world (although I admit it was uncommon). Cthulu was beaten by a boat if I remember correctly. The most important part of Cosmic Horror is the fact that the universe is a cold, desolate place in which our own lives are pretty much worthless and uncomprehensible and uncaring godlike beings rule. We can delay the inevitable or even to a degree fight against it, but in the end it is pointless, which was a feeling this story and the whole of SOI both delivered reasonably well in my opinion. The people of Innistrad slowly lose everything they hold dear to the spreading influence of Emrakul and their only hopes, the angels and the church are corrupted from the get go. Emrakul wasn't defeated, she wanted to be sealed because she couldn't do what she wanted to do. Even the Innistradis weak resistance would have been crushed if Emrakul hadn't done what she did.
And the story makes it very clear that Emeria WASN'T Emrakul, but a hallucination that was forced upon Jace by Emrakuls madness indirectly. She might have revealed a few things of Emrakuls goals that Jace could understand, but she wasn't Emrakul herself, nor was she her whole personality. And yes, outer gods and other lovecraftian entities do have personalities as well, even Azatoth is at one point described as an idiot.
I don't know what you want out of a mystery story. A mystery has to be lifted at some point and that was at the beginning of EMN. Yeah, many of us considered that it was Emrakul, but quite frankly I know a whole bunch of people who were quite surprised by it. Jace's investigation wasn't pointless. He found Tamiyo, he stirred up Liliana, his beginning madness made him vulnerable to Emrakuls influence, he persuaded Tamiyo into helping him... without his investigation, Emrakul wouldn't have had the means to seal herself, perhabs even influencing both him and Tamiyo from the start. And the plot twist was genuinely surprising (and as far as I can see you are in the minority if you think it was badly implemented).
While I admit that I am unhappy about the deaths of Kozilek and Ulamog too, this last part of the whole Eldrazi story redeemed it wholly for me. Just think about it: Now that Emrakul is in the moon, Innistrad is even more hopeless: They can rebuild the church and their civilisation all they want, in the end Emrakul will one day return to finish her job and there is nothing they can do about it. If that's not Cosmic Horror, I don't know what is.
The writing may have been subpar sometimes, but the plot of the SOI block was quite good in my opinion.
Hm, I find it strange actually that so many people had the idea that Theros should have been an enchantment block. I distinctly remember Maro (or someone else from R&D) saying that enchantments were a theme, but not the major component of Theros. That would be gods/monsters/heroes and greek mythology as has been stated before. I still have the feeling people went into that block with false expectations...
I think Heroic and Devotion are most likely to return, for me the whole block felt very focused on those two mechanics (even in flavor). Constellation might too, it was kind of underused in Journey to Nyx. I wouldn't get my hopes up for Tribute, Bestow or Strive (Bestow makes me kind of sad because I think it does have potential).
Gideon is quite the hunk, agreed. Unfortunately there's not more to his character than righteousness, which is a total bore. I'd like to see him facing an inner conflict, where he'd have to choose something over something, and that trauma haunting him later on, or some other more meaningful ways to get some depth in... meaning, I haven't completely given him up yet.
I have to admit that he has been out of characterization focus as of late, but I think people are underestimating him just because of that. The Purifying Fire has already been mentioned, but he also had more nuance in Rise of the Eldrazi (where he had to make the decision to leave Zendikar after witnessing Emrakul), Gatecrash and Pre-BFZ (where the negative aspects of his constant nobility started to show) and Origins had a pretty comeplling backstory for him in my opinion, which explains his motivations pretty well. He has a trauma, the story team just has decided not to let him dwell on it too much. In my opinion he tries to flee the death of his friends (which was his fault after all) by constantly trying to rescue others, which is a kind of coping mechanism. I'm sure that he will get his chance to get more complex characterization again too.
wow. it seems the theme of this thread is "My Wx deck was boring, and looked weak, but I still wrecked face". I really hope Wizards market research reads stuff like this. Then they can see people were either bored, or disappointed, in this prerelease. and all for the same reason. when one colors' commons and uncommons can steamroll every other colors uncommons and rares, its time to start firing people on the design team. I haven't seen any comments of people enjoying this prerelease or showing any enthusiasm (myself included). While I was at them, people seemed bored too. The first chance to play with new cards should not result in a resounding "Meh".
Speak for yourself, up until this second page most people seemed to have enjoyed themselves. And so did everyone at my prerelease (seemingly). Granted, any deck with W felt a little more powerful than with any other color, but from my experience there are often one or two colors which are a bit stronger in the limited environment of a block than the others. Perfect balance is not easy to achieve. I think people are mixing their frustration over standard into their perception of the prerelease. I at least thought it was really fun. I drew Tamiyo, Field Researcher and Emrakul, the Promised End and built a Bant deck which consistently stalled the game until I could get Emrakul out (which was far easier than I thought it would be and I usually got her out with 8 mana or less). Of 5 games I lost 2 only against very fast and aggressive WR and R decks. Best game was the last one in which I activated Tamiyos ultimate and thought how great it would be to draw Emrakul now, which happened and won me the game instantly. The only downside of the prerelease was that someone stole my nondeck card pool when I wasn't paying attention for a minute or so. Never would have thought that might happen. Fortunately my expensive cards were all in my deck.
well I'm sorry to hear your cards were stolen, that's not cool on any level. I am speaking for myself, but also for several people on this page. The first page did have more optimism, admittedly, but it was coming from the people who did very well, and nearly every one played Wx. I saw several people open Tamiyo and they were pretty happy too. I only lost to one deck featuring red and it was a literal mirror match; we some how pulled the same couple rares and played the same strategy. I'm glad for you if your prerelease event had more optimism than mine. Both days had over 30 people and no one was excited really at all. half the place cleared out after the first round, which was ridiculous because at this store you win prizes if you go 2-1-1 so one lose means nothing. But we had a really high abundance of Wx decks winning off the commons while not using even half their rares. I saw exactly 3 strategies, UR spellslinger, Wx commons, UB zombies. nothing else, and the Wx decks all won.
I on the other hand am sorry that your prerelease was such a bummer, but it is not really exemplary in my opinion. We were 30 people at mine too but no one left, the atmosphere was great and the winning deck was B/G delirium believe it or not. I played against two red decks and lost and then against a W/B deck, a W/G human deck and a G/R werewolf deck and won. As I said, W was strong, but it wasn't overwhelming. I also saw a multitude of strategies. My prerelease isn't the standard either, but considering the optimism in most of the comments here I think there was more to it than you give the set credit for.
wow. it seems the theme of this thread is "My Wx deck was boring, and looked weak, but I still wrecked face". I really hope Wizards market research reads stuff like this. Then they can see people were either bored, or disappointed, in this prerelease. and all for the same reason. when one colors' commons and uncommons can steamroll every other colors uncommons and rares, its time to start firing people on the design team. I haven't seen any comments of people enjoying this prerelease or showing any enthusiasm (myself included). While I was at them, people seemed bored too. The first chance to play with new cards should not result in a resounding "Meh".
Speak for yourself, up until this second page most people seemed to have enjoyed themselves. And so did everyone at my prerelease (seemingly). Granted, any deck with W felt a little more powerful than with any other color, but from my experience there are often one or two colors which are a bit stronger in the limited environment of a block than the others. Perfect balance is not easy to achieve. I think people are mixing their frustration over standard into their perception of the prerelease. I at least thought it was really fun. I drew Tamiyo, Field Researcher and Emrakul, the Promised End and built a Bant deck which consistently stalled the game until I could get Emrakul out (which was far easier than I thought it would be and I usually got her out with 8 mana or less). Of 5 games I lost 2 only against very fast and aggressive WR and R decks. Best game was the last one in which I activated Tamiyos ultimate and thought how great it would be to draw Emrakul now, which happened and won me the game instantly. The only downside of the prerelease was that someone stole my nondeck card pool when I wasn't paying attention for a minute or so. Never would have thought that might happen. Fortunately my expensive cards were all in my deck.
There's was something about Sorin bringing vampires into Zen (not sure if established). How he did he do it? And since Nahiri was bitten, what's the consequence?
Something to do with lineage? As in only a progenitor can instill vamprism?
On Zendikar there were no vampires until a bunch of Eldrazi cultists were warped by a (disease? spell? not entirely sure about it) of Ulamog. Those cultists became the first vampires and bloodchiefs, Drana was seemingly one of them. They are another way for Ulamog to drain energy and life from others and when he got nearly freed thousand years before Rise of the Eldrazi he warped them further so that they could be controlled by him and his brood. The bloodchiefs can sire other beings by draining their blood, but if they drain all blood and don't destroy the husk these beings become nulls. Sorin had nothing to do with them being on Zendikar.
Innistrads vampires were a result of Edgar Markov engaging in a demonic ritual involving the death of an angel. It's not entirely clear, but Innistrads vampires can sire others. I think it has to be a conscious decision though, I don't believe that Nahiri could become a vampire just from this one bite if Sorin didn't intend to do just that.
As I've said before in this thread, if the Eldrazi subtype was just thrown out in favor of Horror, there would be half as much complaining as there is now. DFC is a great platform on showcasing eldritch/cosmic horror. The fact that the cards have the subtype of Eldrazi did not mean they couldn't have made more interesting DFC's, that's just a logical fallacy.
Continue to ignore my point at your leisure, I'll just be asking a few questions:
How many creature DFCs did SOI have?
Of them, how many were Werewolves?
How many creature DFCs did EMN have?
Of them, how many were Werewolves?
Of those (and this is because some people don't like Eldrazi at all), how many aren't Eldrazi?
Werewolves are worse off. Non-creature DFCs are worse off. Of the 15 DFCs, 14 are Eldrazi. That's no longer a thematic mechanic of the plane, that's an Eldrazi mechanic.
By all means, they can showcase the horrid transformations, but not at the expense of everything else. We know uninfected werewolves still wander the plane, but do we see any of them? With one exception, no! We know there are vampires with mysterious other forms that aren't corrupted, but do we get to see them? No!
Well, first of all: The SOI block was supposed to be at least partially about Eldrazi and especially Emrakul since the last Innistrad block. That in mind there were not that many ways in which this could have been shown. They obviously didn't intend to make the SOI block another BFZ block, therefore they couldn't do many colorless Eldrazi cards. As was said before, this is not supposed to be an Eldrazi set like BFZ mostly was. So the only other option (and a quite flavorful too) was using the transform mechanic for the Eldrazi. Transform cards can't make up more than a minority of a set and the number of Eldrazi had to be large enough to justify their inclusion (which as I said was decided upon very early). The option they took was to show werewolves (and others) mutating further and becoming Eldrazi AND their old creature type. With only limited space in the set (and this being the possibly ONLY set with eldrazification) they had to make every transform card into an Eldrazi one. The new dronepack werewolves work really good mechanically with the old transform mechanic. They ARE werewolves and not only Eldrazi. You can argue about their strength all day, but this was the best compromise they could achieve in this situation in my opinion.
And set space is always limited. I didn't get Jenrik, Ludevic and another spirit lord either, but that happens because they can't put everything into a block. Innistrad 3 will come and then werewolves (most likely the old ones) will return.
Well the xenophobic part was dropped in all stories afterwards, so there is that. It definitely feels strange that she was xenophobic and elf centric in Zendikar, but when she planeswalked to Lorwyn she defended the goblins without a second thought from the elves (which happened before Teeths of Akoum). The other retcons I felt where not deviating from the previously established characters as much. Racism might have been to strong a word though. I'm glad that it wasn't that much of a retcon as I thought, although it is strange that the bio on the website is considered not canon.
Even during In the Teeth of Akoum she comes to the defense of humans without much thought, too.
The Lorwyn bit is weird, but Oath indicated it isn't as retconned as we thought, and that it's possible that she returned to Lorwyn later.
And I definitely agree with your comment re: character growth after releasing the Eldrazi. Kelly even outright confirmed it on twitter the other day, the intention was that much of her change into BFZ was because of her guilt. Nissa, Worldwaker is a pretty key story because of that.
I'm glad if that is actually the case. I retract my points then I really like it when such problems sort themselves out. I feel that there has been much turmoil about a lot of the new story since Origins and I hope that creative has left these early problems behind them now. The SOI block for me feels like a great improvement to BFZs story and if that trend continues, Kaladesh should be even better.
All libertarians I ever met have the same problem. They are extremely suspicious of the state (not always without reason) but strangely naively trusting in the free market. There is no scientific evidence that the free market automatically leads to profit for everyone and that there is a force at work keeping it stable and orderly (competition for example). This sometimes takes on nearly religious levels. The problem is: there is no such force. Competition in economics and politics doesn't favor the best, it favors the ones who can trick the most people in thinking they are the best and the ones who already start with more than others. People don't make rational decisions all the time, the Homo economicus is nothing but an ideal. Morality also gets the short end as well: Human rights (except for pretty much meaningless "freedom") have no basis in libertarian civilisations and a weak state will never be able to enforce them on ever more powerful corporations. In the end I fear that libertarian countries will always end up with monopolies owning nearly everyone and only acting in their own interest (which as we have seen time and time again in the last few decades doesn't line up with most of the populations or even humanitys own interest). I always favored Germanys social market system as a good (but admittedly not perfect) compromise of socialism and free market capitalism and the constant push for more privatizations here makes me cringe because I don't think it leads to the right direcrtion, especially when private organisations have control over essential things like water. Just my thoughts on the issue.
Don't misunderstand me, I don't really believe that theory, but exactly like you I wouldn't be shocked at this point. It also makes the whole ugly mess of an election much more bearable for me... and I'm not even a United States citizen!
Interesting fact: The trend of calling anyone having percieved "PC" views a SJW has made it to europe as well. Here in Germany the term that is being thrown around is "Gutmensch" (german equivalent of "do-gooder") which I find even more inane. Now wanting to do good is bad as well just because it doesn't align to your political views? Give me a break.
Well, he seems to like Putin very much and we all know how much Putin loves taking half-nude pictures... I'm just saying, it's not of the table
Oh man, Trump and Hillary equally evil demagogues? SJWs rioting in the streets? Implying that only Trump is against terrorism or all muslimes are threatening to kill someoe because of drawings? Hyperbole after Hyperbole? Well I assume Trump IS the right choice for you then. Hillary is no angel, but definitely not a sociopath, that's for sure.
No one stops you from voting Johnson, just do it if you want to.
As a European (to be more exact German) that has always confused me about the electoral system in the US. Here in Germany we have two votes: One party vote and one for our local representative in the Bundestag (our primary legislative power). Both count directly for the results of the vote. Granted, Germany has less than a third of the population of the US, but then again, both are technologically advanced countries, counting votes shouldn't be that hard (I think, of course I know about the Florida debacle in the 2000 election). I mean, theoretically every single voter could vote for Hillary and still get Trump if all electors decide to do "faithless" votes. Doesn't that sound slightly odd to anyone else as well? Just a thought.
On another note, pretty much all european states (except for extreme right-wing parties inside of them) seem to favor Hillary because Trump seems to be viscious, hyperaggressive, doesn't consider facts of any kind (his campaign seems to have embraced the paradigm "Facts don't matter, feelings do!" as far as I can tell from Interviews which is quite worrying) and does nothing to show himself as being reliable or balanced. On the other hand it is also quite clear that Hillary isn't that great a deal either (many over here would have preferred Sanders).
I am still not convinced by the way that he isn't a deep-cover democrat. I can't tell the difference. It's also interesting how his candidacy challenges the GOP and might change it. Interesting times...
EDIT: And if anyone is interested, politifact.com lists how many statements of Hilary and Trump were wrong (or even "pants on fire" wrong). It looks much worse for one of them, I can tell you...
Well, she was lured there and the Emeria projection (which was not Emrakul herself mind you) didn't say anything of her not wanting to purge Innistrad, just that she expected it to somehow be more "appreciative" of her influence. Once she found out it was too late and she had to manipulate the gatewatch to seal herself for as of yet unknown reasons.
Well, she does create mutations and we don't know what her influence would entail on a depleted or lifeless world. We just don't know enough about her true purpose (if there is one) to judge for now. And she probably can still consume mana to replenish herself. She took as much as she needed from Zendikar and then left directly which wouldn't make much sense if she were focussed on consuming as Ulamog for example was. I don't see the inconsistencies you are speaking of is what I'm saying.
Or Emrakul is just using me to disguise the truth. Who knows?
I was disappointed by that too. I think they all succumbed to Emrakuls madness directly after she began to "blossom" the same way the Gatewatch did. Arlinn will probably get more screen time when she reappears in the future (similar to Tamiyo). I know that this was the last story of EMN, but I hope and believe that there will be a story about the aftermath before we go to Kaladesh. Hopefully we'll see Arlinn, Thalia and Sigarda then.
The only definition tvtropes provides is that Eldritch Abominations have to break the internal logic of a work to be considered as such. That's definitely true for the Eldrazi (and Emrakul isn't the pages picture for nothing). They are not bound by the five colors, they exist outside the planes and they warp physical and biological laws. Nowhere does it state that they can't have personalities (and I got you three example from Lovecraft alone, nevermind that Cosmic Horror is not bound to Lovecraft alone).
Cthulu was defeated by it, just not permanently (which is possible within Cosmic Horror as I've laid out in my first post). And Liliana was grossly overestimating herself, something totally in character for her. It might even have been her own version of the madness. Remember, she was once kind of an Abomination herself. Oldwalkers certainly fit many of the criteria.
Well, of course they had to keep the whole utter despair more subtle than in Lovecrafts works, it's still a game about battling each other. It would have been a short story if the army amassed by St. Traft and Thalia would succumb to it and joined the madness back in SOI. The point is that Emrakul herself was never even in danger of being defeated. She manipulated everything as she saw it fit the whole time and will probably continue her work in the future.
As for Jaces jokes: Trying to cover fear with humor is a coping mechanism widely used by human beings. The story made it pretty clear that he tried to use it to not fall into total despair (at least that's how I read it). Jace also never investigated who the culprit behind the madness on Innistrad was, he wanted to find Sorin at the start of SOI. I will go so far to say that he wasn't the Investigator of the story, Tamiyo was. She did do all the things you described and figured out that Avacyn was holding back something powerful from Innistrad which at the same time caused her madness. I'll give you that Jaces part of the story was not part of the investigation then directly.
Emeria was an effect on Jaces mind, he didn't create her. She was everything of Emrakuls true personality his mind was able to grasp in any kind of form. But she wasn't Emrakul herself. His seperated self was another thing entirely.
I see where you are coming from but as I said, I can't agree with you. And I for one liked the SOI/EMN part of the story (except for a few aspects) quite a bit and didn't "lower my standards".
Ok, I couldn't disagree more with you. As someone else said, in the original genre, you COULD talk to eldritch abominations (at least certain ones like Nyarlhotep (he was not "just an exception" by the way, I remember other outer gods like Yog-Sototh interacting with humans too, it even had a son with one)) and you could even sometimes grasp some of their agencies (both of which was not good for your mental and physical health though). In "The Dunwich Horror" one such abomination was clearly destroyed before it could destroy the whole world (although I admit it was uncommon). Cthulu was beaten by a boat if I remember correctly. The most important part of Cosmic Horror is the fact that the universe is a cold, desolate place in which our own lives are pretty much worthless and uncomprehensible and uncaring godlike beings rule. We can delay the inevitable or even to a degree fight against it, but in the end it is pointless, which was a feeling this story and the whole of SOI both delivered reasonably well in my opinion. The people of Innistrad slowly lose everything they hold dear to the spreading influence of Emrakul and their only hopes, the angels and the church are corrupted from the get go. Emrakul wasn't defeated, she wanted to be sealed because she couldn't do what she wanted to do. Even the Innistradis weak resistance would have been crushed if Emrakul hadn't done what she did.
And the story makes it very clear that Emeria WASN'T Emrakul, but a hallucination that was forced upon Jace by Emrakuls madness indirectly. She might have revealed a few things of Emrakuls goals that Jace could understand, but she wasn't Emrakul herself, nor was she her whole personality. And yes, outer gods and other lovecraftian entities do have personalities as well, even Azatoth is at one point described as an idiot.
I don't know what you want out of a mystery story. A mystery has to be lifted at some point and that was at the beginning of EMN. Yeah, many of us considered that it was Emrakul, but quite frankly I know a whole bunch of people who were quite surprised by it. Jace's investigation wasn't pointless. He found Tamiyo, he stirred up Liliana, his beginning madness made him vulnerable to Emrakuls influence, he persuaded Tamiyo into helping him... without his investigation, Emrakul wouldn't have had the means to seal herself, perhabs even influencing both him and Tamiyo from the start. And the plot twist was genuinely surprising (and as far as I can see you are in the minority if you think it was badly implemented).
While I admit that I am unhappy about the deaths of Kozilek and Ulamog too, this last part of the whole Eldrazi story redeemed it wholly for me. Just think about it: Now that Emrakul is in the moon, Innistrad is even more hopeless: They can rebuild the church and their civilisation all they want, in the end Emrakul will one day return to finish her job and there is nothing they can do about it. If that's not Cosmic Horror, I don't know what is.
The writing may have been subpar sometimes, but the plot of the SOI block was quite good in my opinion.
I think Heroic and Devotion are most likely to return, for me the whole block felt very focused on those two mechanics (even in flavor). Constellation might too, it was kind of underused in Journey to Nyx. I wouldn't get my hopes up for Tribute, Bestow or Strive (Bestow makes me kind of sad because I think it does have potential).
I have to admit that he has been out of characterization focus as of late, but I think people are underestimating him just because of that. The Purifying Fire has already been mentioned, but he also had more nuance in Rise of the Eldrazi (where he had to make the decision to leave Zendikar after witnessing Emrakul), Gatecrash and Pre-BFZ (where the negative aspects of his constant nobility started to show) and Origins had a pretty comeplling backstory for him in my opinion, which explains his motivations pretty well. He has a trauma, the story team just has decided not to let him dwell on it too much. In my opinion he tries to flee the death of his friends (which was his fault after all) by constantly trying to rescue others, which is a kind of coping mechanism. I'm sure that he will get his chance to get more complex characterization again too.
And well... he is a hunk, no doubt about that.
I on the other hand am sorry that your prerelease was such a bummer, but it is not really exemplary in my opinion. We were 30 people at mine too but no one left, the atmosphere was great and the winning deck was B/G delirium believe it or not. I played against two red decks and lost and then against a W/B deck, a W/G human deck and a G/R werewolf deck and won. As I said, W was strong, but it wasn't overwhelming. I also saw a multitude of strategies. My prerelease isn't the standard either, but considering the optimism in most of the comments here I think there was more to it than you give the set credit for.
Speak for yourself, up until this second page most people seemed to have enjoyed themselves. And so did everyone at my prerelease (seemingly). Granted, any deck with W felt a little more powerful than with any other color, but from my experience there are often one or two colors which are a bit stronger in the limited environment of a block than the others. Perfect balance is not easy to achieve. I think people are mixing their frustration over standard into their perception of the prerelease. I at least thought it was really fun. I drew Tamiyo, Field Researcher and Emrakul, the Promised End and built a Bant deck which consistently stalled the game until I could get Emrakul out (which was far easier than I thought it would be and I usually got her out with 8 mana or less). Of 5 games I lost 2 only against very fast and aggressive WR and R decks. Best game was the last one in which I activated Tamiyos ultimate and thought how great it would be to draw Emrakul now, which happened and won me the game instantly. The only downside of the prerelease was that someone stole my nondeck card pool when I wasn't paying attention for a minute or so. Never would have thought that might happen. Fortunately my expensive cards were all in my deck.
On Zendikar there were no vampires until a bunch of Eldrazi cultists were warped by a (disease? spell? not entirely sure about it) of Ulamog. Those cultists became the first vampires and bloodchiefs, Drana was seemingly one of them. They are another way for Ulamog to drain energy and life from others and when he got nearly freed thousand years before Rise of the Eldrazi he warped them further so that they could be controlled by him and his brood. The bloodchiefs can sire other beings by draining their blood, but if they drain all blood and don't destroy the husk these beings become nulls. Sorin had nothing to do with them being on Zendikar.
Innistrads vampires were a result of Edgar Markov engaging in a demonic ritual involving the death of an angel. It's not entirely clear, but Innistrads vampires can sire others. I think it has to be a conscious decision though, I don't believe that Nahiri could become a vampire just from this one bite if Sorin didn't intend to do just that.
Well, first of all: The SOI block was supposed to be at least partially about Eldrazi and especially Emrakul since the last Innistrad block. That in mind there were not that many ways in which this could have been shown. They obviously didn't intend to make the SOI block another BFZ block, therefore they couldn't do many colorless Eldrazi cards. As was said before, this is not supposed to be an Eldrazi set like BFZ mostly was. So the only other option (and a quite flavorful too) was using the transform mechanic for the Eldrazi. Transform cards can't make up more than a minority of a set and the number of Eldrazi had to be large enough to justify their inclusion (which as I said was decided upon very early). The option they took was to show werewolves (and others) mutating further and becoming Eldrazi AND their old creature type. With only limited space in the set (and this being the possibly ONLY set with eldrazification) they had to make every transform card into an Eldrazi one. The new dronepack werewolves work really good mechanically with the old transform mechanic. They ARE werewolves and not only Eldrazi. You can argue about their strength all day, but this was the best compromise they could achieve in this situation in my opinion.
And set space is always limited. I didn't get Jenrik, Ludevic and another spirit lord either, but that happens because they can't put everything into a block. Innistrad 3 will come and then werewolves (most likely the old ones) will return.
I'm glad if that is actually the case. I retract my points then I really like it when such problems sort themselves out. I feel that there has been much turmoil about a lot of the new story since Origins and I hope that creative has left these early problems behind them now. The SOI block for me feels like a great improvement to BFZs story and if that trend continues, Kaladesh should be even better.